The Demon Princes, Vol. 2: The Face * The Book of Dreams (Demon Princes, 2)

'The Demon Princes' was once published as five separate books, but in 1997 was reissued into only two volumes, the first volume covering the first three princes and the second volume covering the forth and fifth.Kirth Gerson is just a boy when his village and planet are ransacked in a joint venture by the five most evil, most powerful criminals ever. They called themselves The Demon Princes. Kirth survives, along with his grandfather, who then raises the boy to become the ultimate revenge maker on the ruthless princes. After the death of his grandfather, Kirth finishes his training and is ready to take on the five demon princes. Volume Two covers the last two princes, Lens Larque (The Face) and Howard Alan Treesong (The Book Of Dreams).The Face has to be my favorite story of the five tales. Gerson hears rumor of Lens Larque, and begins to suspect that Lens is Darsh, from the planet Dar Sai under the Coranne sun. The Darsh are unattractive, heavy boned and often corpulent, and have a foul odor from the unpalatable food they prefer.Kirth begins his hunt on Aloysius, where he begins to suspect Lens is the owner of a worthless company called Kotzash. Gerson begins to secretively purchase stocks of Kotzash, trying to gain controlling shares. His interests soon take him to Dar Sai, a searingly hot planet where the Darsh live underneath huge umbrellas. Here, he meets a girl from Dar Sai's neighboring planet, Methel. The Methlen are a cliquish folk, arrogant and refined. Kirth falls in love with Jeridan Chanseth, and follows her to Methel while still attempting to uncover Lens Larque. The Face, spanning these three planets, is filled with gripping adventures, close calls, and an ending that will leave you rolling on the floor laughing your hinder off.The second tale in Volume Two is The Book Of Dreams, and Gerson's pursuit of Howard Alan Treesong. Using trickery and ostentatious foppery, Gerson attempts to lure Treesong out of hiding by circulating a possible photo of Treesong in a contest through his magazine.Treesong is not only heartless and ruthless but completely insane, and proves to be quite slippery. Gerson uses a pretty girl named Alice to establish communication with the elusive Treesong and bring him out of hiding. Treesong has a strange illusion of several Paladins as part of his personality, and often speaks in different tones and styles.You will love the ending to The Book Of Dreams almost as much as The Face, where we meet Otho and Tuty Cleadhoe, an older couple with a personal vendetta against Treesong that rivals Gerson's motives.'The Demon Princes', both Volume One and Two, are the best of Jack Vance's works that I have read to date. If you love vividly strange worlds as much as I do, then you can't go wrong with Vance. SciFi with a touch of humor, and some of the most imaginative worlds and societies in writing, Vance books always seem to satisfy me. Enjoy!

The language!! never read so many words in one book (rather, 2, including volume 1) I did not know the meaning of till I read the Demon Princes books. These books are worth reading for the richness of the English alone!The two stories/books in this volume continue in a similar vein as in the first volume. The plots are very well planned, there is enough 'action' and both stories end in a highly satisfactory fashion. Each villain has a distinct personality and the hero's approach to unravel the identity in each story is very well written.Each book in the two volumes lives up to the imaginative titles, and are as intriguing as the titles.

The first three novels in this series were published from 1964 to 1967, after which Mr. Vance lost interest in the series and might not have completed it had it not been for the efforts of Donald A. Wollheim. Mr. Wollheim, a huge fan of Vance, left Ace Books in 1972 to start his own company, "DAW" books. DAW reprinted the first 3 novels and Wollheim was able to talk Vance into completing the series. Thus, the fourth novel, "The Face" appeared after a 14 year hiatus in 1981, and "The Book of Dreams" quickly followed.All five novels in the series are representative of Jack Vance's genius as a writer, and are stylistically quite similar. But the character development and tone of the last two are remarkably different from the first three. It seems that in the intervening 14 years, Mr. Vance had learned to add a depth and pathos not found in his earlier work.Everyone has their own opinion, but I've always considered "The Face" to be technically the best of the lot, while "The Book of Dreams" is the oddest. In that last work, the fifth Demon Prince is treated with an uncharacteristic sympathy, and, unlike the previous 4, even acquires a sense of nobility.A nice, short biography of Vance is available at: [...]

In 1979, Jack Vance returned to the saga of Kirth Gersen after a decade's pause. Somehow he managed to keep the writing relatively seamless despite the interregnum, and its back to the Oikumene we go - but notably not to Beyond, the setting of some earlier Demon Princes work. This volume is a collection of The Face and The Book of Dreams, in which Gersen tracks down Lens Larque and Howard Alan Treesong respectively, and - at last - comes to the end of his quest with a final statement which echoes the end of The Worm Ourobouros published in 1922 (and in which the protagonists are referred to as "demons"). Somehow this ending is more than satisfactory, despite being all too brief.The adventures themselves are a mixture of action, adventure and detective work: indeed the unmasking of Lens Larque is almost an afterthought with other adversaries to overcome and mysteries to solve. But the stories are both vintage Vance: James Bond in space with better wisecracks is a fair and reasonably accurate summary, for all it misses the point completely.The Book of Dreams is the final piece of the puzzle, and Howard Alan Treesong perhaps the most memorable villian - and perhaps the most pitiable, in a fashion. All up, the Demon Princes series is some of Vance's best work, equal to Planet of Adventure or Alastor, and behind only Lyonesse and Dying Earth in his longer works category.

Three books under one cover--what a great deal! I read the whole series and the related but not sequential continuation by the great Matthew Hughes. A real treat. Great writer and each book is unique in its approach to the complete story.

Primo science fiction from one of the all time master's of the genre. Vance's prose is richer and more evocative than most writers' poetry, and he has a grasp of the endless mutability of human culture to surpass even most anthropologists. A superb read!

Great Job, no problem with these people.

J'ai toujours rêvé de trouver les écrits de Jack Vance en anglais, tellement il m'a apporté de bonheur à les lire en français. Grâce à Amazon c'est chose faite. Je rentre peu à peu dans l'esprit de Jack Vance en original, c'est génial !...J'ajouterai juste que les anglo-saxons font une meilleure présentation et facilité de lecture en imprimant ces livres... Surtout pour Tschaï,.on pourrait en faire autant, pourquoi économiser l'encre et le papier ?...

good

Beware: missing pages 143-158Wonderful stories, shame about the book production